about Graeme's first beach trip

Two weeks ago, Aaron called me and told me that he was pretty sure they were taking a group of middle and high schoolers to the beach for two nights after he got home from Camp KidJam. I asked him if this was a trip that Graeme and I could tag along on, since they were only going two hours away and we had just been home alone the week before.

It ended up working out, and we were able to spend two nights at Wrightsville Beach this week. It was so exciting taking Graeme to see the ocean for the first time.

His first view of it was from our balcony. I'm sure it just looked like a big blob to him from that far away, but he still seemed pretty entranced. After Aaron checked all of the students in to their rooms, we had a few minutes to take him down to the water. He loved it!

Our best attempt at a family beach selfie with the sun blinding us:

Poor Graeme.

Thankfully, we got some actual family pictures taken the next day by our very awesome friend Joe.



Anyway, the next day, my parents drove over for a few hours. That worked out wonderfully, because Aaron was pre-occupied, and I'm not sure how I would have carried Graeme and the bazillion things required to take him on the beach by myself.

I wish I would have taken a picture of our set-up.

Graeme went down to the ocean a couple of times and got his legs in the water. We had mentioned that we were going to the beach to the pediatrician at his appointment the other day, and she asked what we were doing to protect him in the sun. We said we just planned to keep him out of it. She agreed this was best, but also told us it would be fine to try some sunscreen on him if we just put it in one little spot first and made sure it didn't bother him. We ended up using it with no problem. It didn't bother him a bit, and it gave me a better peace of mind for the times he was more exposed to the sun. (Of course we still kept him under the umbrella for the most part!)

Checking out the water with Grandy.

The beach tired him out, and after about two hours, he was done. My mom helped me get him back to our room and we gave him a quick bath to de-sand and de-sunscreen him. Then, he took a two hour nap.

We had a lot of fun at the beach. Even though we couldn't participate in the majority of the retreat or see Aaron very much, it was much better than being home! Aaron and I are hoping to take Graeme to the beach one more time this summer...maybe in September when it's still warm, the prices drop, and he's old enough to sit up and play in the sand. We'll see.

I wish Graeme would have been awake with me to watch the amazing storm over the water the night before we left. Aaron was still downstairs, and I went out on the balcony to watch. The lightning lit up the beach over and over again.

It was pitch black, but the lightning made it look like this!

So that was our first trip with Graeme to the beach, and another look at what growing up as a ministry kid will be like. He gets to do lots of cool stuff! He's four months old and has already been to a conference and a beach retreat. Ha!

He's such an easy-going baby, and he is a champ switching up his surroundings and his routine. He just goes with the flow...

A nap in the stroller outside of the hotel.

Playing with Sophie in the Lobby.

after four months of Graeme's life

Oh my goodness! Graeme Grayson is four months old today!

We got the worst part of turning four months old over this morning:  the shots. He had to get three needle sticks. I cannot even watch. Aaron stands with him because my heart can't take it. Thankfully, it was over quickly. We gave him Lovie and his bottle and he was calmed down in no time. For the rest of the day, he's been his normal, smiling self. He didn't have any bad reactions to his two month shots, so hopefully he won't for these either since they're the same ones. 

He weighs 17 pounds and is 26 inches long. He's back on the charts for his height, but he's in the 91%! What a growing boy we have.

This past month has brought so many changes...

Graeme can roll over both ways, although he doesn't do it it very often. He is so funny about it. Some days we'll encourage him to do it all day with nothing. Some days I leave the room for a second and he's flipped over when I come back. 

He laughs. The first time Graeme really, really laughed, Aaron and I were both there. Aaron stuck his tongue out, and Graeme must have thought it was pretty funny. He let out a little laugh like we had never heard before. We spent the next twenty minutes trying to get him to do it over and over. Now, he laughs often. He thinks his Daddy's crazy voices are pretty funny. He laughs when you blow raspberries on his cheek or his stomach. For some reason, he thinks the chorus to "Love Shack" is funny.

He sleeps all night! Woo hoo! This is pretty recent, but I'm believing it's for good! He sleeps from 7pm-7am with a quick feeding around 11pm. There have still been a couple nights where he'll fuss in the middle of the night, but I make sure he can reach Lovie and he goes right back to sleep. I'm pretty excited about this.

He's getting really good at soothing himself to sleep. The nights and naps when he cries when we lay him down are few and far between now. He usually just talks or makes a kind of fussing sound until he drifts off. This is so nice, because I hated hearing him cry after we stole the pacifier.

He is completely enamored with his Daddy. It is so, so adorable. When Aaron comes home, all Graeme does is stare at him and smile. If I'm feeding him, and Aaron walks in, he stops eating to smile at him. He really adores him.

I can't believe that we have had Graeme around for one-third of a year now. He is growing and learning and melting us into little pieces every day with his sweet smile. We love you, Graeme.

feeling rested

Yesterday was Sunday, and for the first time, I had to double check my calendar to remember how many weeks old Graeme turned. 17 weeks. Seventeen.

Every Sunday, I think back to the Sunday that he was born. I say something like "Seventeen weeks ago, we were holding our brand new baby..." And then Aaron says, "Are you going to do this every Sunday for the rest of his life?" (But he really doesn't mind.)

It's getting a little harder to think in terms of weeks as the number of them keeps increasing. I cannot even believe our little guys turns four months old on Wednesday.

Aaron got home from camp last Thursday afternoon. I was curious to see what Graeme would do when he saw Aaron, since it had been almost four days. He was asleep when Aaron walked in the door, and a little later I had Aaron wake him up. After he rubbed his eyes and snuggled in to Aaron's shoulder for a minute he leaned back and looked at him. Huge smile. He was so, so happy to see him. He couldn't stop staring at him for the rest of the day.

Penny was excited to see Aaron too. We all were!

I didn't want post about this right away in case it was a fluke or to jinx it:  Graeme has been sleeping through the night for the past three nights! The first night he did it, I could hardly believe it! I woke up at 5:30am, and I was so excited that I never fell back asleep!

I am so proud of Graeme. We are still doing his "dream feed" around 11pm for now. After a couple weeks of consistent through the night sleeps, I'll probably wean him of that feeding too.

Aaron is going on a student beach retreat at the end of this week, and Graeme and I get to tag along. I'm pretty excited to take our little guy to the beach for the first time. I will probably take just a few photos...

about our FL to NC drive

As promised, I shall recount for you the trip home from Florida.



If you were to drive straight through with no stops and no traffic from my grandparents house to Raleigh, it would take you about nine hours. This is, of course, impossible, unless you had a car that didn't need gas for 600 miles or a bladder that didn't need to be emptied. It is definitely impossible with a three-month-old and a dog that hates the car.

Nonetheless, we set out in high spirits from my grandparents at 11:15am with a tired baby that fell right to sleep for a nap and a Penny that resigned herself to the backseat for a long drive home.

Our first conundrum was that after you drive an hour from my grandparents, you officially leave behind the majority of civilization for the next two hours. We didn't want to stop after just one hour (don't wake a sleeping baby just so you can eat somewhere that's not sketchy!). But, we knew we wouldn't make it two more hours either. We figured we would press our luck and find somewhere to stop in the "deadlands."

Graeme took a long nap, but it was eventually time to stop so he could eat. We were hungry too. We came upon a McDonalds, and that seemed to be our only option. Unless we wanted to eat at "Grannie's Kitchen." Which we did not.

Now, our next issue was that it was 90 degrees outside in the middle of the afternoon. We couldn't (and wouldn't) leave Penny in the car. This meant we had to cart our things over to some picnic tables that this McDonalds had outside. Thankfully, they were in the shade under some trees. I poured Penny some water into her travel dish and started feeding Graeme. Aaron went in to the restroom and then came out and switched with me. I ordered food to-go and brought it outside.

We wanted Graeme to be able to stretch out after 2 hours in his carseat, so we layered a changing pad and a couple blankets on the picnic table so he could lay down and wiggle. He didn't seem to mind his strange surroundings. He did, however, kick over Aaron's ginormous, full-to-the-brim sweet tea that spilled all over the table barely missing our phones and keys. The boys shared the blame on that one.

We got back in the car after our McDonalds picnic and pressed on. I sat in the back with Graeme now that he was awake and we played for awhile. After another hour, he and I both fell asleep.

When I woke up again, Graeme was already awake. Aaron and I figured we should start searching for our next stop. I checked my phone and realized we had again passed all decent civilization. We were in the middle of Georgia with nothing much in sight for miles. We settled on a TA Travel Center after a few exits of Waffle Houses and Exxons.

This time, there were no shady picnic tables. Aaron got gas and then parked the car. He took Penny outside. I put some water in Penny's dish and set it in the cup holders up front. Then, I fed Graeme in the backseat. When he was done, I laid him down back there so he could stretch out, and I got in the passenger seat and leaned over to talk to him. When Aaron came back, we switched, and I went in to buy some snacks for us.

Upon returning, I sat in the driver's seat to eat my yogurt. Aaron was eating his granola bar. All of a sudden, I hear, "Oh no!" Aaron hadn't noticed Penny's water in the cup holder and set his phone down in it. It was only a 1/4 inch deep, and he has an Otter Box, but he freaked out anyway. I let him carry on, and went around the car to change Graeme's diaper. When I opened the diaper to find more than I bargained for, I quickly searched for the wipes with one hand while holding Graeme's legs and feet up out the mess. Aaron was still panicking over his phone. And then I heard a water-splashing sound. 

I looked up to see Graeme peeing all over his face. And the blanket he was laying on. And his shirt. While he laughed and smiled. Now it was my turn to freak out. "Aaron!!"

After a wipe down, literally, for Graeme, and throwing all of the pee-soaked things in the crowded trunk, we set off again. I took a turn at the wheel and Aaron sat in the back with the kids. I asked him to tilt the mirror that we have to see Graeme from the front because it had shifted in all of the mayhem. When he went to move it, it disintegrated. The straps that wrapped around the headrest fell apart. So there was that.

We drove on.

I asked Aaron if I could have one of his Pringles. He said "Sure, here you go." I reached my hand back blindly and smashed the Pringle to pieces all over the car. So there was that.

We drove on.

Our next, and what we hoped was our last stop ended up being at Wendy's. We tried to hold out for Chick-fil-a or Zaxby's, but it just wasn't in the cards. It was 8:00pm and Graeme was tired and hungry. It was cooler outside now, and we only planned on a 20 minute stop, so we cracked the windows for Penny and hurried inside. Of course, this Wendy's had just one girl taking orders and gathering everyone's food. So that took awhile.  We scarfed down dinner and made sure Graeme was full and dry. We started off again with just three hours left to drive. We thought he would fall asleep and sleep until we got home.

Wrong.

He would not go to sleep. He got himself so worked up that we even resorted to trying to give him a pacifier I had in the diaper bag. He wouldn't even take it (which made me happy in the sense that we at least broke him of that for sure!). After 20 minutes of non-stop crying, we pulled over and got him out. He was all smiles as soon as he was out of the carseat. I pointed out that the exit we had chosen had a very nice looking Holiday Inn. It looked very inviting at this point. But with less than three hours to go, we pressed on.

I sat in the back with Graeme again to try to keep him calm so he could go to sleep. He was much happier with me next to him, but now he was only interested in smiling and playing. Then, the hiccup monster came. That hiccup monster chooses the worst times to visit usually.

Graeme gets the hiccups pretty often and they last for-ev-er. At least, that's what it seems like. Especially after being in the car for ten hours. The hiccups got him all upset, and then I started to smell something strange. Seriously kid, again?

Yes. Again.

We pulled over, again, less than 2 hours away from home.

I changed Graeme in the car and apologized very profusely that he did indeed have to get back in his carseat. He started the most pitiful cry. I sat with him and held his hand until he finally fell asleep. At this point, it was 10:30pm. We pulled up to our house at 11:45pm. Just 12.5 hours from when we left Florida.

It was a long, long day, but we had so much fun laughing about all of our misfortunes and adventures. Poor Graeme got fed up with the carseat there at the end, but who wouldn't?!

What fun memories we made on our very first road trip together.

while Aaron's gone

Hi. It's been awhile.

I'm sitting here after accomplishing my first time of putting Graeme to bed by myself. I realized that Aaron has put Graeme to bed without me a couple of times, but I had never done it without him. Thankfully, it's a pretty easy endeavor these days.

Aaron is away at Camp KidJam until Thursday afternoon. I've made it through the first day! I hate when Aaron is gone. I, of course, love that he's at camp investing in kids. I wouldn't want him to miss that for anything. But, selfishly, I wish he was here with me too!

Graeme, who always has to be woken up in the mornings, was up bright and early today. Aaron had to be out the door before 7am, and apparently Graeme didn't want to miss saying goodbye. I told him that I was certain this should not be a new routine.

I try to distract myself as much as possible when Aaron's gone. My mom kept Graeme for a few hours today and I had a much-needed house cleaning day. I usually clean on Tuesdays while Graeme takes his naps. It takes all day by the time I'm done. While I was pregnant, I remember planning out a cleaning schedule so that I could divvy it up over the course of a few days. I've since realized that I would much rather do all the cleaning in one day and have it done for the week.

Anyway, I got my cleaning done today instead of tomorrow because my awesome sister-in-law, Sarah, offered to come hang out with me for the day tomorrow. I am excited to have company and am looking forward to spending time with her and Graeme.




Here's something random:

A year ago today I took a pregnancy test and it showed up positive. We couldn't believe it! And here we are a year later.

How wonderful is that?




Tomorrow night, I plan to tell the tale of our adventurous drive home from Florida. Tune in...

in Florida

Hello from sunny Florida and Happy Independence Day!

Graeme is asleep in the pack-n-play for his second nap, and I thought I'd pay some attention to my neglected blog.

We are having a great trip. We left Wednesday afternoon right at 2:50pm and we rolled in to my grandparent's driveway at exactly 2:15am on Thursday. We stopped three times on the way, and Graeme only cried a few times. He wasn't too keen about falling asleep in his carseat for bedtime, but once he did, he was fine. For a twelve hour trip with a 3-month-old, we can't complain at all! 

We've kept him on his routine and he's taken to his new surroundings like a champ. He is, of course, the center of attention!



Aaron had to work on Wednesday until we got in the car to leave, so I was in charge of packing. I didn't mind, and even though Graeme must have sensed my to-do list and didn't want to take long naps, I got everything done. When I got it all downstairs, I was pretty certain there was no way it was all fitting in our little Honda Civic.

Graeme was asleep in his swing at this point, so I began the task of loading the car. After a huge fight with the stroller and the rock-n-play (which I finally won), I was pretty pleased with myself for getting everything in the trunk except for the four little bags that were filled with things for Graeme and needed to go in the backseat.

Yeah...I'm not sure how that's ever going to work again. Especially since Aaron has since acquired a ginormous, orange stuffed owl that he found at Cracker Barrel for our new preschool set at church.

My grandparents have an in-ground pool that's screened-in. Graeme has been in the water both days that we've been here and he loves it.

We didn't bring his little bathtub down here. It obviously would have either sat in someone's lap or been strapped to the top of the car! Graeme took a bath in a couple of inches of water in the regular bathtub last night, and apparently we wasted our money on the Finding Nemo baby bathtub with infant sling. Graeme was all about the big bath. We will have to try to video him in there next time. He would have stayed in the bath for a very long time and been so happy. I'm so glad he's a water-loving baby.





I am so glad Graeme is down here making memories with his family. He is surrounded by five grandparents right now, so he's getting plenty of snuggles.

Getting kisses from Great-Great-Gramma Pierce while his Grandy looks on.

Graeme is the fifth generation from his Gramma Pierce. How awesome is that?

"And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation."

Luke 1:50